Political correctness or poor practice?

'Cultural sensitivity' has been blamed for compromising the safety of Victoria Climbié. But were black social workers involved in the African girl's case hindered by institutional racism, asks David Batty

In his opening statement to the public inquiry into the death of Victoria Climbié, lead counsel Neil Garnham, QC, said there was "no evidence of overt racism" in the agencies that failed to protect the African girl from her murderers.

But, at first glance, the evidence put forward over the past seven months appears to confirm some of the worst stereotypes of "right-on" social workers, portraying a professional culture where "politically correct" ideas about race and ethnicity took precedence over child protection guidelines.

Social worker Lisa Arthurworrey admitted interpreting Victoria's relationship with her killers on the mistaken assumption that the eight-year-old was, like herself, of African-Caribbean origin. As a result she perceived the girl's timidity as a cultural show of respect rather than fear.

Her evidence led Mr Garnham to observe that "assumption based on race can be just as corrosive in its effect as blatant racism.

"Race can affect the way people conduct themselves. Fear of racism can stop people acting when otherwise they would. Fear of being unsympathetic to someone of the same race can change responses," he said.

A succession of witnesses have implied that poor practice by frontline black social workers involved in the case went unchallenged by their managers and other professionals from fear of being accused of racism.

Carole Baptiste, manager of the team responsible for Victoria's case, was said to have spent most of her supervision sessions with junior staff discussing "her experiences as a black woman" and allowed a dispute about obeah, a type of West Indian witchcraft, to split her office.

Her white social services director, Mary Richardson, admitted that she knew "Baptiste was not the strongest manager we had". But she also suggested that black staff might have colluded to conceal the extent of the former team manager's poor practice because of her race.

Meanwhile, Dr Mary Rossiter, a white consultant paediatrician at North Middlesex hospital, said her opinions had sometimes been ignored by black social workers because they believed they knew more about ethnic minority children.

Ratna Dutt, director of the Race Equality Unit, a charity that provides race awareness training to social workers, said ethnic minority staff were keen to challenge practice because they had personal experience of racism.

But, she argued, this did not mean their views were beyond reproach. White professionals, particularly managers, could not be allowed to absolve themselves of responsibility by hiding behind concerns about cultural sensitivity.

"I'd rather be called a racist than allow bad practice that puts a child at risk to go on," said Ms Dutt. "It reflects poorly on a manager's skills and the regard they have for service users if a manager doesn't tackle poor practice because it concerns a black worker's relationship with a black client.

"The implicit message is that it's acceptable for ethnic minorities to receive poor services under the guise of superficial cultural sensitivity. This is absolutely shameful, as it allows people to argue that good practice is compromised by anti-racism."

In the opening seminar of the second phase of the Climbié inquiry, which considered how to make services more inclusive, Ms Dutt said ethnic minority public sector workers were often regarded as race experts, regardless of their knowledge and experience. They were then given inappropriate responsibility and pilloried when mistakes were made.

"When you're in a predominantly white agency you are often seen to have the expertise around culture and race and so you're asked for advice on that," she told SocietyGuardian.co.uk. "That's often the only time you're regarded as having special knowledge, so despite their misgivings they give that advice.

"As a result, the status of black workers only goes up when they're working with black service users. But in terms of professional development they get no support, so bad practice is allowed to flourish.

"That means that often we get information about culture that is completely inappropriate and people constantly ask questions about whether it is culture when actually the question should be completely different. Then what happens is a tragedy like Victoria Climbié, and the impression that employing black staff is a bad idea."

The media encouraged this simplistic version of events by ignoring allegations of racial prejudice within the child protection agencies involved, Ms Dutt added. For example, Haringey team leader Angella Mairs said Metropolitan police officers routinely bypassed black social work managers, including herself, to consult their white colleagues.

"If the failings in Victoria's care were all due to race equality then how come Lisa Arthurworrey and Angella Mairs have been suspended, while Mary Richardson is now on a higher salary as director of Hackney social services?" she asked.

"For a large number of black frontline staff if the finger of blame is pointed at them they don't end up in jobs in other local authorities. That's how institutional racism operates."